Less-Educated Workers Face Erratic Schedules, Unpredictable Incomes

Workers without a college degree and those in industries including retail are disproportionately likely to have variable schedules based on their employers needs, a Federal Reserve survey found.
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Associated Press

Federal Reserve Chairwoman Janet Yellen has spoken out about the need for better educational opportunities for low-income communities. A new survey from the central bank suggests the challenge is an uphill one marred by high levels of unpredictability and instability for less-educated workers.

The 2016 survey, released Friday, added a number of new questions this year about how workers' schedules vary, on whose terms and how much notice workers are given about their schedules.

Most people enjoy predictability in their work lives: nearly three-quarters of employees normally work the same hours, and 8.5% of respondents' schedules vary mainly at the employee's own request.

However, a sizable share of the workforce, 16.9%, said their schedule varies based mainly on their employer's request--and for more than half of those people, that comes at very short notice. Within this group, 37.4% get one day's notice or less about their hours, while 16.5% get two or three days' notice.

What's more, workers with no more than a high school degree are more than twice as likely to have an employer who varies their schedule as workers with at least a bachelor’s degree.

"In particular, less-educated workers and those working in the retail/wholesale trade industries, food services, or entertainment industries are disproportionately likely to have variable schedules based on their employer’s needs," the survey found.

That could help explain why income volatility remains a problem for many households. The proportion of adults who said their income varies to some degree from month to month was 32% in 2016, unchanged from the prior year. Within this group, 43% cited an irregular work schedule as the reason their income varies, a number also unchanged from 2015.

The gulf between workers with a high school education or less and those with a college education has been widening for decades as demand for mid-skilled jobs has hollowed out. Ms. Yellen said in March that workforce programs are particularly important now because of “significant job market changes in recent years, brought about by global competition and technological advances.”

A major change highlighted by the Fed survey is "a shift in job quality," as seen by the unpredictable scheduling many lower-skilled workers face, said Jonathan Morduch, a New York University economist and professor of public policy.

The instability in workers’ schedules also appears to be rippling through to respondents’ eviction rates and their struggles to pay bills, he said. Another new question in the 2016 survey found that 9% of renters who moved in the previous two years did so because they were evicted or faced the threat of eviction.

The latest data reinforces the picture of "two worlds where we've got some folks who are really stuck and others who seem to be doing pretty well in the economy," Mr. Morduch said.